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It is very important that people that are close to a person with autism, to understand how invasive, confronting, uncontrollable, heavy and mentally exhausting a meltdown can be in the human brain. Most meltdowns start with an overdose of (earlier) sensory or stress overloads, which will shut down higher-order brain functions.

In a meltdown, (almost) all executive functions (like reasoning, memory, planning and decision-making) are shut down. Everything gets slower with no focus. Language is affected too and it becomes (almost) impossible to communicate adequately with others using normal structured sentences, while finding the right matching words. The brain becomes (very) chaotic because focus starts to wither. This is a moment where it becomes difficult to find a way out of the situation.

When not able to escape the situation, this neurological chaos in the brain can build up and result in a total internal cognitive shutdown or an explosive outburst, which is quite common during a meltdown. This explosive outburst may seem to come from nowhere, but it is mostly an end-result of an accumulation of sensory, cognitive and emotional overload, which may have started hours or even days earlier. Continue reading “When in meltdown, take care!”→

Real-time messaging has been a great invention for many of us, except, when the time is not right, those messages could get more annoying than a wood-workshop at full volume next to the ears, pushing up those stress levels to the limits; Especially when you want to do a task which requires full attention at hand.

Everyone with a smart phone is mostly connected 24/7 to various apps, like Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Tumblr and (many) more. This gives the advantage to be reachable at all times, but also brings a burden to be “too much” connected to the on-line world, bringing extra sensory overloads through that (super fast) connection of your phone.

Most people want to (and can) be reachable 24/7, but with autism and ADHD, it has its perks, especially when being in a mental state where there is no more platform to communicate actively with other parties. Most people see real-time messaging as granted and can become mad when you do not respond (in a timely manner) to a message being sent to you, making the anxiety and stress only raise in level.

Now, this one is a heavy one to come out with, because it is something which I am entirely not proud of. Not only is structural order a necessity in every modern house, but it is also the only way, to be able to receive people in a “clean” environment, without getting the instant thought of being a caveman or worse. Paperwork can already make a huge difference in that setting.

This is information on a great illustration (see below) which I found at Google images about autism. It has all key-points, while making aware that autism is: (1) not a disease but a disorder, (2) having many types and (3) the umbrella in DSM-5.

It happens almost every time, when meeting someone I know and getting that first word which is Hi and I already know what the next question is going to be. It are those hidden rules of communication and social engagement, which are totally not hidden at all, but yet, not entirely understood. Because, depending on my answer to that question the rest of the conversation will either drastically change or it will just finish with a smile and a goodbye.. Continue reading “How are you? Those dreadful words!”→

There’s always a great pun with me and idioms about time. A lot of people say that time flies, every second counts, time is money and other taglines. That’s all too great, if I had any concept of time! Especially when someone says to me “wait a minute”, I get that smile on my face and instantly think: “how long do you want that minute to be?”… Continue reading “How do I grasp time?”→